Mea Culpa

The 2011 Malayalam film Adaminte Makan Abu (Abu, Son of Adam) is the story of a poor perfume seller and his wife who yearn to go on a pilgrimage to Haj. After raising the money, the couple begins preparations which include attending preparation classes conducted by the travel agency, being vaccinated and buying new clothes. Abu pays off even the smallest of his old debts as part of the preparations and travels miles to seek forgiveness from Sulaiman, a previous neighbour with whom he once had differences.

It was interesting to learn about the Islamic ritual of begging forgiveness from everyone. Jains observe a forgiveness day when they request forgiveness from each other for offences committed. The ancient Prakrit phrase, ‘Michchhāmi Dukkadam’ (may all the evil that has been done be fruitless) is used when a person makes a mistake, or recollects making one in everyday life, or when asking for forgiveness in advance for inadvertent ones.

In Latin, we find the word ‘Mea culpa’ (through my fault). It comes from a prayer of confession in the Catholic Church. Said by itself, it's an exclamation of apology or remorse that is used to mean ‘It was my fault’ or ‘I apologize.’ Mea culpa is one of many English terms that derive from the Latin ‘culpa’ meaning guilt. By owning up to the guilt, one is liberated of the burden of denial.

However, taking ownership of ‘mea culpa’ should not be an occasional emotion! We need to take stock regularly at the slights or the hurts we cause to others. As often as possible, we must own up to our errors. If we procrastinate, we may delude ourselves with justifications. When we unite our consciousness with the choice to own up and ask for forgiveness; we positively impact the demolition of the burden of guilt.

When ‘mea culpa’ is connected with forgiving

the ‘unite to impact’ results in guilt-less living!

                              

- Pravin K. Sabnis

Goa, India.

Bed of Nails

Some persons seek to impress their audience into believing that they have acquired powers that make them immune to pain. To demonstrate this capacity, they sleep on a sharp pointed bed of nails. The gullible audience can be swayed by such acts, but the facade of super powers is ripped off when we realise that the impact is due to the method in the union of the nails.

3 inch long nails are fixed on a plank half an inch apart. The nails, being at close distance, naturally act as a bed and will not enter the flesh as the body weight is equally distributed on the nail bed. Since the nails are numerous enough, the weight is distributed between them such that the pressure exerted by each nail is not enough to break the person's skin.

This demonstration of the principles of weight distribution shows that the weight of the volunteer is spread over as many nails as possible. And it is this lesson that needs to be learnt. When the members of the team are aligned in close proximity and they do not feel the burden as it is distributed over many. The weight of the load is reduced when shared among various load bearers.

The bed of nails is based on simple code

We ‘unite to impact’ by sharing the load!

                              

- Pravin K. Sabnis

Goa, India.

Efficiency

Two weekends ago, Dr Pawan Agarwal had everyone spellbound at BNI Goa Member’s Day. His zeal was reflected in his fluently flowing presentation based on his research of an amazing community. With his trademark flair, he shared the motives and the methods of Mumbai’s Dabbawallas.

Every working day, over 5,000 white-capped ‘dabbawallas’ get on cycles, each loaded with about 40 lunch boxes. Weaving their way through the gridlocked traffic of India's business capital, they collect, deliver and bring back lunch boxes from home to office and back using the railways. The logistics needed would almost certainly defeat the best efforts of any other supply chain network. In fact, they maintain the same method over the years and it works!

It is testimony to what simplicity can achieve. Dabbawallas are recognised for consistently delivering efficiency but sans a complex, technology-driven system. They have built a reputation of trustworthiness by using simple ways of coding, delegation and team working. All these are further empowered by fortnightly meetings to resolve conflicts and bolster best practices. Come storm or rain, they ensure that no external or interpersonal conflict will derail their efficiency.

So often we invest on complex technological systems and lose focus on the most important human resource. We focus on the method and skip the importance of team building. Eventually success comes from using simple innovative methods and empowering ownership among the team members. The Dabbawallas carry devout commitment to their work along with happiness that comes from pride in their community.

Indeed, to deliver efficiency we need to focus on building such devotion to work and feeling of ownership in our teams. This is done best by connecting to best practices and regular sharing at meetings to cope with incidental issues. These basics unite to impact our capacities when applied to simple systems that have worked over the years.

No need to reinvent the wheel, stick to basics plain

When teams ‘unite to impact’ efficiency is the gain!

                              

- Pravin K. Sabnis

Goa, India.

Percussion

Last Friday, an awesome ‘Jugalbandi’ was organised by the united efforts of Panaji’s  Samraat Club, Rotary Club, Inner wheel Club and the International Centre Goa. The notes of Manish Pingle’s slide-guitar fused with those of Sandeep Mishra’s Sarangi and the Tabla beats of Prasun Chaterjee. Before their performance, Goa’s ace drummer, Carlos Gonsalves was felicitated by the Governor of Goa. Carlos replied to the felicitation with his percussion.

His amazing performance included not only a variety of drums and sticks but also assorted utensils and everyday things like the seat he was seating on! He seemed to hold the capacity to turn every skin and shell into a percussion instrument. His developed skill of music was uniting to impact the potential of percussion that lay in the various surfaces.

Indeed, once again the togetherness of expertise and potential was in full display. The same was noticed in the ‘Jugalbandi’ where the great players connected their developed skill with the full potential of their instruments. The music that they were able to draw from their musical tools indicated the unison of the artist and the implement.

But in case of the percussion players like Carlos or the great ones like Zakir Hussain, Sivamani and others; their capacity to make everything sound interesting is found exciting by audiences. Of course, other music players are not lesser in attractiveness, but in the case of the percussion players, the listeners see the unfolding potential of even things considered to be disconnected from musical capacities.

While personal development of individual skill is valuable, its combination with connecting to latent potential in others is the seed for discovering greater treasures. We must realise that success gets positively impacted when the competency of the individual is united with the discovery of performance possibilities of the team members to eventually create the pleasing percussion.

When individual skill connects with potential of the other person

Truly then we will ‘unite to impact’ the possibilities of percussion!

                              

- Pravin K. Sabnis

Goa, India.